William Levi DAWSON

1886-1970

DAWSON, William Levi, a Representative from Illinois; born in Albany, Dougherty County, Ga., April 26, 1886; attended the public schools and Kent College of Law, Chicago, Ill.; was graduated from Albany (Ga.) Normal School in 1905, Fisk University, Nashville, Tenn., in 1909, and Northwestern University Law School, Evanston, Ill.; during the First World War served overseas as a first lieutenant with the Three Hundred and Sixty-fifth Infantry 1917-1919; was admitted to the bar in 1920 and commenced practice in Chicago, Ill.; State central committeeman for the First Congressional District of Illinois 1930-1932; alderman for the second ward of Chicago 1933-1939 and Democratic committeeman since 1939; elected as a Democrat to the Seventy-eighth and to the thirteen succeeding Congresses and served from January 3, 1943, until his death November 9, 1970, in Chicago, Ill.; chairman, Committee on Expenditures in Executive Departments (Eighty-first and Eighty-second Congresses), Committee on Government Operations (Eighty-fourth through Ninety-first Congresses); cremated; ashes placed in Columbarium in Griffin Funeral Home, Chicago, Ill.

Bibliography

Manning, Christopher. William L. Dawson and the Limits of Black Electoral Leadership. DeKalb, IL: Northern Illinois University Press, 2009; âWilliam Levi Dawsonâ in Black Americans in Congress, 1870-2007. Prepared under the direction of the Committee on House Administration by the Office of History & Preservation, U. S. House of Representatives. Washington: Government Printing Office, 2008.

Source: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, 1771-Present